Faubel expecting straight battle with Talmacsi

The battle between Bancaja Aspar team-mates Hector Faubel and Gabor Talmacsi in the 125cc class reaches a crucial point tomorrow.

The battle between Bancaja Aspar team-mates Hector Faubel and Gabor Talmacsi in the 125cc class reaches a crucial point tomorrow. Whilst only the latter can win the title this weekend, the World Championship could essentially be lost if Faubel has a bad race in Sepang.

Just a solitary point separates the duo in the standings, meaning that no points for Faubel coupled with a Talmacsi win would see the title go to the Hungarian. Any other result would see the enthralling duel between the Aspar colleagues go right down to the wire, at Faubels home race in Valencia.It is the Spaniard who has the upper hand after qualifying, having taken pole by just over a tenth of a second from Talmacsi. Speaking at the post-qualifying press conference, Faubel played down the advantage of starting at the front of the grid.Its nice to have the pole position, but you dont get any points for it so it is not that big of a help for me. It serves more as a psychological thing. I would prefer to have points than to be on pole, said the 24 year-old.Whilst he and Talmacsi will be fighting hard amongst themselves, a tightly packed 125cc field full of race winners with nothing to lose means that they will also have to watch out for the competition. Faubel has previously fallen foul in such situations, and memories of colliding with Simone Corsi and finishing 17th at Misano will be on his mind tomorrow. The Spaniard does, however, believe that the race will be a straight fight between himself and his team-mate.From what I have seen in practice, two riders are going faster than the others. That means that we will probably be out on our own and I can try and prolong the championship until my home race.